Some moments in time can serve as a picture of your life in miniature, as a kind of analogy. Today (Thursday, August 30th 2012) was one of those days.

Like most other residents of Louisiana, we spent yesterday at home, keeping our eyes on Hurricane Isaac. The church office had been closed, and I had felt pretty well — I even made a video which parodies melodramatic weather reporters. (I will try to link it here.) I got up this morning and felt pretty well. I was in the office by 9:00, and was looking forward to finishing my Sunday morning message. I remarked to myself how well I felt — pretty much like “normal”, I thought; not sick at all. I wondered if we were getting this dysautonomia under control at last. I was planning for what I might do in the afternoon, once I had finished the message prep. But in a moment, it all changed.

I had worked for 3-4 hours, and had been getting a lot done. I was about to finish the second of three points on the message when I got up to get another drink of water, which I do often, as staying hydrated is important with POTS. But as I stood by the sink, all of the sudden I began to get that familiar “dizziness”, with a warm, flush-like feeling on my face, like I often get with POTS spells. But this was a little more intense than some of the “spells” are. We had moved a recliner into my library room so I could rest between Sunday morning services, and I decided I’d best sit there for a while. After a couple of minutes I determined to get up and try to keep working on the sermon. But it was very hard to read while I felt like that. I knew that continuing was useless; I was going to have to go home. I really wanted to try to at least finish that second point before I left, but it was so hard to concentrate. I finally found the last scripture I needed to complete that point, typed it in, and then quickly packed everything up, and retreated home. I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening in my recliner at our house, feeling basically as poorly I had at church earlier.

I had to shake my head at what a quick turnaround it had been: from “I feel normal today” and “what am I going to do with the rest of the day”, to “Now I’m sick; I can’t finish my work and I have to go home.” It was amazing to me how suddenly the day had been altered, and how much I had taken for granted. I simply assumed that the rest of the day would be like the first part was — but it sure wasn’t. In fact it was drastically different.

That is where this POTS episode pictures my whole life in miniature. Like this day, I started my life healthy. I have never had a surgery. Most of my adult life I have run for exercise, often in 100-degree heat, laughing at those who worried about it. Just last fall I ran a mile with each class in our church’s school, 12 different mile runs that day. I took pride in my physical condition. And I assumed that I would always be as healthy as I had been. I imagined that I would be strong well up to my 90’s and beyond. But just as suddenly as my day changed today, the sudden onset of POTS this spring totally changed my overall physical condition. I am no longer healthy, but struggle physically virtually every day. All my assumptions went quickly out the window.

So today was really a picture of my life in miniature: I had a great start, assumed without thinking that it would continue to be as it was, but had a rude awakening due to POTS which totally altered the rest of my time. But I will add that for neither today nor my life in general is that the end of the story. In between dizzy spells this evening, I did manage to rally and finish my message! I guess the analogy continues? Because with God’s help, I do not plan to let POTS stop me from serving. Like today, I just may have to do it in between dizzy spells!